If we view uncertainty as causing curricular chaos, then we’re justified in
attempting to eliminate it. Not
all uncertainty, however, leads
to chaos. One way to think
about uncertainty in the
context of classrooms is that
there is good uncertainty and
bad uncertainty (Beghetto, 2016a).

Bad uncertainty results from
learning experiences that don’t include
necessary supports and structures. In
such situations, students have no idea
of what’s expected of them. They also
don’t know whether, when, or how
they will receive support when they
need it. When structure and support
are lacking, chaos is likely to ensue.

If on top of this lack of supportive
structure we ask students to tackle
complex challenges or ill-defined
problems, then we really are inviting
chaos into our classroom, presenting
them with a double whammy of
uncertainty.

Good uncertainty, however, provides students opportunities to engage
with the unknowns of a challenge
in an otherwise supportive, well-structured environment. For example,
when students are trying to come
up with their own ways of solving a
problem, teachers can let them know
in advance about key constraints (such
as time and materials), what’s required
for success, and how they can get
additional assistance if they get stuck.

Although it may not be clear in
advance how to best approach or
solve a complex challenge, students
still receive the guidance necessary to
navigate the doubts and confusions
connected to the problem they’re
attempting to solve.

This approach relates to why it’simportant to inject uncertainty intostudents’ learning experiences. Putsimply, uncertainty is what makesa problem a problem. If you alreadyknow how to move from A to Z, thenyou don’t have a problem—yet ourstudents will face problems in life. Ifwe want to unleash student problemsolving, we need to give them chancesto respond well to uncertainty in thecontext of a supportive environment.

2Try Lesson Unplanning

To invite uncertainty in their classrooms, teachers need to make room
for it. They can do so by making
slight adjustments to pre-existing
lessons—what I call lesson unplanning.

This refers to replacing some predetermined element (such as the problem
or process) with a to-be-determined
(by the students) component. Doing
so transforms a routine exercise
into a more complex one (Beghetto,
forthcoming).

Lesson unplanning can be usedwith any preplanned learning exerciseor activity. You might start small byunplanning just one feature of analready planned lesson. Let’s say yourtypical approach is to teach studentshow to use a procedure to solve mathstory problems, and then assign thema set of similar problems to solve usingthe just-taught procedure. This is aroutine exercise because the featuresof the task are predetermined; there’s aclearly defined problem, solution, andprocedure for arriving at the solution.You could transform this exerciseinto a more open-ended one byremoving the requirement tosolve it using the predeter-mined method and insteadrequire students to comeup with as many differentways of solving the problem asthey can.

Niu & Zhou (2010) observed a 3rd
grade math teacher in China who took
a similar approach. As a result, her
students generated more than a dozen
unique, mathematically accurate procedures for solving one math story
problem.

In such cases, students still have an
opportunity to reinforce their understanding of the concepts just taught.
But instead of being limited to solving
a dozen practice problems one way,
students can learn how to solve one
problem a dozen or more ways. The
key advantage of doing so is that students learn that even problems with
fixed solutions can be approached in
many different ways. So if students
get stuck trying to solve a problem
one way, they may realize that there
are likely other ways to solve it—and
persist or seek assistance rather than
give up at the first sign of difficulty.

Although teachers may already
include a few problems and activities
that incorporate uncertainty in these
ways, it’s worth exploring what would
happen if they used lesson unplanning
systematically throughout their entire
curriculum. The more opportunities
students have to practice working
through problems when things are less
spelled out, the more likely they’ll be
able to take on increasingly complex
challenges (Beghetto, forthcoming).